Praise the Lord for this
last Wednesday of October, 2014. We will be gathering for our Mid-week
fellowship and study this evening at 6 PM followed by choir practice at 7:30 PM.
I have posted a short video, "Come to Jesus and Live". It is posted on YouTube
and also on the Union Center United Methodist Church's facebook page. We are
praying that facebook will be another outreach to take the words of the Lord
around the corner and around the globe. We are praying about it, and planning
to post at least two video messages per week. Please pray that the Lord would
use it to bring blessings to many.
The Lord is blessing
Sunita, Andy, and Gabe in Cypress. Jessie and Tom have spent some time visiting
them there. Sunita reminds me that Barnbas was from Cypress. The Lord used
Barnabas as the "Son of encouragement" everywhere he was sent. The great
revolution set in motion through Christ was taking hold and spreading, but it
needed people to serve it, to give their lives to it. When the church in Jerusalem heard about this, they
sent Barnabas to Antioch to check on things. As soon as he arrived, he saw that
God was behind it all and in it all. He threw himself in with them, got behind
them, urging them to stay the course for the rest of their lives. He was a good
man that way, enthusiastic and confident in the Holy Spirit's ways. The
community grew large and strong in the Master …. [Barnabas was] there a whole
year, meeting with the church and teaching a lot of people. It was in Antioch
that the disciples were for the first time called Christians (Acts
11:22-26, The
Message).
This passage of Scripture
has always challenged me. On the surface it's simple. There was a need to
encourage a new group of believers, so they sent Barnabas. He said yes to the
need, yes to the challenge, and threw himself into it for a season of his life.
He taught and mentored, led and invested himself, serving in any way possible.
We're told he spent a year of his life doing this.
Often we are reluctant to
invest our time in the Kingdom Enterprise. Often we invest our time and talent
and even our treasures in trivial pursuit. Barnabas gave a year of his life. He came to know first-hand
what serving through giving could do. It changed his life, and it changed the
lives of others, so when the opportunity came to do more, the choice was
obvious. He knew serving gave force to his life. He knew that being a servant
would enable him to make the biggest difference he could possibly make. He knew
that the church was the hope of the world and that service to it was
everything. He took his skills and leadership abilities, and poured them into a
local community of faith so that the kingdom could expand.
Barnabas' service and
ministry called for a name change. The impact of his service was so significant
that the people in Antioch called that group of believers "Christians," which
means "little Christs." The
term Christians had never been used before that moment but, because of
Barnabas' investment, people's lives were being transformed into the very
likeness of Christ. For this reason people called them Christians—little
Christs - and that term has stuck around for 2,000 years. It all came to be
because Barnabas chose to be a servant, just like Jesus.
Barnabas was a great man.
People still talk about him today. Notice what we're talking about here. It
was not about the money he made in real estate or business, but the money he
gave away. We're not talking about the people he climbed over or through to get
to the top, but the people whom he helped. We're not talking about the
companies he built, but the communities of people he served.
We're not talking about his
success, but his significance. That's what Jesus wants people to talk about
when they think of us.
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